


Please Don't Eat Me!

by FrenchKey



Series: Stony Fairy Tale Bingo 2018 [1]
Category: Goldilocks and the Three Bears (Fairy Tale), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Fairy Tale Elements, M/M, Not seriously, Stony Fairy Tale Bingo, bot squad, mentions of cannibalism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-20
Updated: 2018-03-20
Packaged: 2019-04-05 04:14:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14035944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FrenchKey/pseuds/FrenchKey
Summary: When Steve gets lost in the forest and is chased by a bear, he thinks that's it. Who does the mysterious cavern belong to and how will they react to finding Steve inside?





	Please Don't Eat Me!

**Author's Note:**

> This is my fill for S5 on my Stony Fairy Tale Bingo card - Goldilocks and the Three Bears. I hope you enjoy my take on it! 
> 
> Thank you to [ Bill_Longbow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bill_Longbow) for the fabulous beta job!

Once upon a time, in a small town in a small country, there lived a man and a woman. They were happily married for many years and nothing could touch their happiness. Nothing, save the fact that they had yet to conceive, despite long wishing for a child. They were desperate to be parents and tried every remedy available. It took many years, but eventually they bore a son. The babe was considered particularly beautiful among the townsfolk and the couple named him Steven Goldenlocks for the colour of his hair.

He grew, as babies do, doted upon by his parents and their neighbours. He wanted for nothing and was welcome in every home nearby. He wandered wherever his feet took him and collected friends as easy as breathing. Despite being quite spoiled by all, he managed to grow into a kind and considerate young man, if rather naive. Having never left the confines of the town, he was unaware of the realities of the wider world, but this never crossed his mind.

One day, Steven wandered further from home than ever before. He reached the edge of the town and found himself among the farms that constituted its border. It was the first time he had ever seen so much green and he walked among the fields for a long time. Eventually, he began to feel hunger gnawing at his belly and turned for home. Unfortunately, his sense of direction, which worked well enough among the familiar buildings of the town, was not equal to the task of returning him home. 

Steven soon found himself in a patch of trees. He remembered skirting a small wooded area earlier in the day and decided that the quickest way home was no doubt through these trees. He had never learned to tell a small pine plantation from an old oak forest and he was soon hopelessly lost in a forest that was growing ever darker. Despairing and hungry he sat down upon a log.

‘No doubt I’m going to starve here. My poor parents! They’ll never know what happened to me!’ he wailed. 

Steven was not usually a man prone to despair but being lost and hungry in a deep forest will challenge even the hardiest of men’s spirits. He dropped his head into his hands and wept. 

A low growling filled the air. Steven looked up, directly into the muzzle of a large bear. Not knowing what to do, he yelped, turned tail and ran as fast as he could. The bear gave chase. Steven knew that he could not outrun it and began to search for a place to hide. He knew he had only moments before the beast caught up with him and he became dinner. 

Suddenly, he noticed a cranny in a rockface to his left. He threw himself into it desperately, wriggling and writhing to fit his body into the small space. He scraped his knuckles and his face on the unforgiving rock but he made it through. He dropped to the ground with a harsh sob and lay there, winded and terrified. The bear snuffled around the entrance and swiped at it with its paw but it could not reach him. Steven curled into a ball and shook with fear.

Eventually, he calmed and uncurled himself. Night had fallen. Yet the inside of the cave was not as dark as he thought it should have been. He considered leaving. Everyone had heard tales of the sorcerers that lived in forests and stole children or beautiful young men away. He looked outside. He knew the danger of the forest now and was not keen to experience it again. Perhaps he would be safer just staying where he was? After all, he had no proof that this was a sorcerer’s lair. Even if it was, surely he’d be safe here at the entrance? He curled up on the cold stone ground and prepared to wait for morning.

It did not take long for Steven to begin to shiver and wish for a thicker cloak. He had expected to be out in the sun all day, not curled in a dark, damp, and cold cave. It was unlikely that it belonged to a sorcerer. No doubt he’d found the entrance to some kind soul’s basement. They wouldn’t mind him taking shelter for the night. Convinced, he set off down the tunnel. It was a tight squeeze and he had to crawl several times. At one point it narrowed so sharply that Steven was forced to slither through on his belly, ripping his breeches and further scraping his hands and knees. He kept going towards the light that kept getting brighter and brighter.

He came to an abrupt stop at the edge of a massive underground space. It was warm and brightly lit. This was no basement but he doubted it was what a sorcerer’s lair would look like either. He could scarce make sense of anything he saw. Tools and papers were scattered everywhere. There were pieces of bent metal and parts of unintelligible contraptions lying around. What there wasn’t, was an inhabitant. Steven stepped out of the shadow of the entrance and paused.

Nothing happened. He let out a sigh of relief and headed straight for the table in the middle of the room. Beside some of the flotsam and jetsam that was everywhere, he could see mugs. He hoped that one of them might contain water. The first was plain white, showing the silhouette of a three-clawed hand. Underneath it said ‘High Three?’ in blocky letters. Steven picked it up and raised it to his lips. Before he could take a drink, he caught a whiff of the contents and dropped the mug in horror. It landed on the table among the papers and tipped over. Black, viscous fluid poured out, soaking everything around it. Steven shook his head.

The second mug was gold and had a picture of a fire extinguisher on one side. The other read ‘Not the community college!’ in a gaudy red. Steven picked it up and sniffed carefully. Vinegar. He put it back down, a few inches away from where he’d found it. Some sort of oil and vinegar. He wondered what sort of person lived here. They were certainly strange. The last mug was bright blue and emblazoned with ‘Trust Me! I’m an Engineer!’ in bright white letters. A tentative sniff told Steven that it was full of nothing but water and he gratefully gulped it down. 

Thirst slaked he looked around for something to quell the rumbling of his stomach. A long counter ran along one side of the room. It had three small brown bags lying on it. They looked like the kind that Steven got from the market, filled with nuts or small fruits. He picked up the first one and frowned as it rattled. Opening it he discovered it was full of small, round bits of metal. He tossed it down and they spilled out across the counter. The next bag was no better. It contained several long nails, which also spilled across the counter. He tried the last one, hoping that it held something edible. As soon as he saw them, he began stuffing the blueberries into his mouth. It wasn’t a large snack but to his stomach it felt as wonderful as a full meal.

Once he’d finished the blueberries, Steven looked around the cavern for somewhere to sit. The cold was beginning to sink into his bones and he was exhausted. He’d been up with the sun that morning and all of the running and terror had not been restful in the least. Crossing the room, he saw something that looked like it could be sat on. It was a bizarre shape and appeared to be made of metal but he decided to give it a go anyway and sat down. He immediately leapt back up, shaking and quivering with surprise. The contraption had hit him with something. It buzzed in his bones and felt a little like the air after a lightning strike. He shivered and moved on. 

The next thing he came across was a similar platform to the last. He gave it a dubious look. Instead of sitting down, he poked at it gently. When it crackled and spat sparks at him, he shook his head and moved on. This place was decidedly strange. If he hadn’t been so tired, he would likely have run for home long ago but he had to be honest with himself. He wouldn’t make it if he didn’t get a chance to sleep first. Wandering around a corner, Steven came across a large heap of blankets. The sight jolted him out of his musings and he poked at them gently. Nothing happened. He lifted a few up to discover that they had all been piled on a low bed. He burrowed under them and curled up. Sleep was not long in coming to him.

***

Anthony crossed the clearing that led to his cavern quickly. The bots trailed after him, trilling questions that he couldn’t answer. JARVIS had alerted him that he needed to return home but had not provided any other information. All Anthony knew was that it wasn’t a dangerous emergency. He reached the rock face that hid his door and pressed his palm against the hidden panel. The rock creaked apart and he entered, the bots rolling in behind him. Dum-E had a basket of berries and greens held in his claw and Butterfingers was holding a sack filled with the rabbits that had been snared in Anthony’s traps. 

The entrance looked the same as it always did. Anthony pursed his lips and sent the bots to deposit their burdens in the usual place. He crossed the room and opened the door to the workshop on a whim. The place was a mess, but that wasn’t unusual. Something was different though. Anthony couldn’t put his finger on what it was but something had changed in his space. The bots rolled in past him. Anthony stood at the door looking around. A flurry of beeping arose from the bots. Anthony frowned.

‘What’s that, Dum-E? Someone’s been drinking your motor oil?’ he said.

Anthony crossed the room and examined the black stain that had spread across the table. He noticed the fact that the mug full of vinegar that he’d been using to clean some of Butterfingers’ parts had moved and his own mug was empty of the water it had held. He frowned. More beeping interrupted his thoughts.

‘Someone’s been eating your nails, Butterfingers? I doubt it.’

Nevertheless when he crossed the room to look, the bags of bolts and nails that Dum-E and Butterfingers had painstakingly collected and sorted for him were scattered all across the bench and some had landed on the floor. His own bag of blueberries, the last of the season that he’d collected himself, were gone. He scowled. He jumped as Dum-E let out an outraged whistle, followed soon after by one from Butterfingers.

‘What’s wrong, you two? Your charging stations have shorted? That’s impossible. I built those. They don’t just short out. Someone’s been tampering, clearly,’ Anthony muttered.

This was not allowed. He rounded the corner, fully intending to throw himself onto his blanket nest and have a stern conversation with JARVIS about what constituted an emergency. It was clear that there had been an intruder in the workshop and that just wasn’t something he would put up with. JARVIS hadn’t given him enough warning to come home and catch the thief either. 

The blanket nest looked wrong. Anthony glared at it and stalked closer. It had taken him ages to get the blankets in just the right comfortable configuration for nesting and now they had all been moved. He growled. He was about to rip them all of the bed and begin sorting things out when he noticed the movement. The blankets were moving. He blinked. The intruder was still here! The intruder was sleeping in his blanket nest. He circled around until he could see the top of the person’s head. It was covered in golden hair that looked incredibly soft. The nest moved again.

***

Steven stretched and rolled over. This didn’t feel like his bed. He blinked his eyes open and screamed. Wriggling and flailing he landed on a hard surface and scrambled backwards, away from the face that was looming over him. His back hit rock and he pressed himself against it, panting for breath. Where was he? How did he get here? For one wild moment, he thought he’d been kidnapped before he began to remember the events of the night before. This must be the owner of the cavern. The sorcerer of the woods!

‘Please don’t eat me!’ Steven begged, pressing his eyes shut and cowering.

‘Eat you? Eat you?’ the man said. ‘Now, why the hell would I want to do that? C’mon, get up. You’re trailing all my blankets on the floor and god knows they’re filthy enough to start with. Up, up, up. Come on.’

A hand grasped Steven’s elbow and dragged him t his feet. He was deposited back onto the bed and sat there, shivering in fright. When nothing happened, he opened his eyes and looked up at the man. He hadn’t got a good look earlier due to his panic. He stared. The man was gorgeous. Compact and lean with deep brown eyes and a frankly gorgeous beard. His hair was dark brown and flopped over his forehead in a little wave. Steven couldn’t believe his eyes. No one had ever warned him that sorcerers could be cute.

‘Soooo,’ the sorcerer drawled, ‘Who are you and why are you in my workshop?’

‘Umm, I’m… umm…’

The sorcerer raised an eyebrow.

‘I’m Steven Goldenlocks but all of my friends call me Steve,’ he blurted out in a rush.

‘Anthony. Or Tony if you prefer,’ the sorcerer, no, Tony, said.

Steve smiled at him. 

‘None of that,’ Tony said, wagging his finger, ‘Why are you here and how did you get in?’

Steve took a deep breath and began to explain the events of the night before. Tony listened attentively, occasionally humming or asking a question to clarify something. Once Steve had finished talking, Tony made him show him to the hole he’d come in through. He examined it, humming and nodding.

‘While I’m glad it was there and allowed you to escape being eaten, I’m going to have to block it off. You’re not the world’s smallest guy and if you can get in through it then so can most other people. I’d rather that wasn’t something that could happen. I tend to prefer not having visitors,’ Tony said.

‘Is that why you eat them?’ Steve blurted out. 

He clapped his hands to his mouth in embarrassment. He hadn’t meant to say that. He’d been doing so well but now there was no doubt he was going to get eaten or turned into a toad or used in a magical experiment or something. Tony was giving him a very odd look.

‘I don’t know what your obsession is, but I don’t eat people. I know I’m a bit odd but I eat rabbit and venison and beef like anybody else. I never have, and never will, eat a human. So, wherever you got that idea, forget about it, yeah?’ Tony said.

‘But you’re the sorcerer of the woods. Everyone knows that you eat trespassers!’ Steve said.

‘Oh my god, is that old rumour still going around? No wonder you were terrified of me. I’m not a sorcerer. No magic here. Just science. I’m an engineer. I work with metal and electricity to make things. The sorcerer thing was started by a rival engineer who was jealous that I was better than him. I don’t have the first clue about anything magical. And I definitely don’t eat people.’

‘Oh,’ Steve murmured, ‘I see.’

‘Come on. We’d better get you home. People will be wondering where you’ve got to.’

‘I…’ Steve began.

Tony stood patiently and waited.

‘I wanted to see your work,’ he murmured quickly.

‘You can come back and visit,’ Tony assured him, ‘But right now, we need to get you back where you belong before people start searching. I like my privacy out here.’

***

So Anthony, the engineer of the woods, led Steven Goldenlocks down the safe paths back to the town and left him there to return to his parents. They were overjoyed to have their son returned safely, having been sure that he had been mauled or eaten or some other terrible fate had befallen him. They listened to his story and determined that they must give a gift to the engineer of the woods in thanks for returning their son to them unharmed.

Thus it was that, after a day or two to recover from his ordeal, Steven was sent once more into the woods to visit Anthony. He came bearing a basket of fruit and a carving of a bear, done by Steven’s own hand. Anthony welcomed him in and showed him around the workshop, explaining his own brand of magic as he went. Steven returned home that night with tales of bright lights and magic that ran along wires and created miracles. 

He returned regularly to the cavern in the woods, always with a gift and often with something small that Anthony’s expertise could fix. Eventually, tales of the family’s woe with a broken cart pulled Anthony from the workshop and into the town where he met Steven’s parents and was welcomed in for a meal. He fixed the cart and returned home but his friendship with Steven began to blossom from that day. It was not long after that that the pair entered into a relationship.

They were married in the spring and split their time evenly between the workshop in the woods and Steven’s modest home in the town. While the small family, for Steven too began to see the bots as his own children as much as Anthony’s, faced their share of problems, including the reappearance of the jealous rival, it is fair to say that they did, indeed, live happily ever after.


End file.
